i4 PILYSICAL GEHOGRAPILY OF THE SHA. 
In the eastern Mediterranean new measurements have proved 
that they are still more considerable, while in the western part 
of that inclosed sea they are almost imperceptible. 
The differences of level caused by the Mediterranean tides, 
are indeed too inconsiderable to attract the general notice of the 
inhabitants on the coast, but in the famed Euripus, the narrow 
channel which separates the island of Eubcea or Negropont from 
continental Greece, the tide produces the striking phenomenon 
of very irregular fluctuations of the waters, from one end of the 
channel to the other. 
This phenomenon was of course completely inexplicable to 
the ancient philosophers, and Aristotle is even said to have 
drowned himself in the Euripus in a fit of despair, since, with 
all his prodigious sagacity, he could not possibly solve the 
mystery. For us, who know that peculiar formations of the 
sea-bed and coasts are capable of considerably augmenting the 
force of the floods, and that tidal waves rushing into a narrow 
channel in opposite directions, and at different times, must 
necessarily produce irregular fluctuations of the waters, the 
phenomenon of the Euripus has ceased to be a mystery. 
